Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Do You Prefer Mandarin or Cantonese?

No I'm not talking about food. Although it is yummy and given the correct portion sizes very healthy, but the Chinese I'm referring to is language. I know there's this continued brouhaha over dual language education that masks a lot of racism from whites and their desire to hold onto a majority populace in relation to people speaking Spanish. 

China is going to be next superpower so we'd better just get used to it. How many formerly US-based businesses are there now? How many of our products are manufactured there? How many of our economic bail-outs are they financing? How much money do they have invested over here? We don't want China or all the other foreign gov'ts calling in their markers. 

I'd also recommend learning some Russian. Georgia hasn't been granted NATO status just yet! Besides Russia has lots of oil. This gov't destroyed their financial infrastructure and I'm certain they haven't forgotten. 

US citizens are notorious for being insular, xenophobic and not knowing any other languages than English - if that. I'm not fluent in other languages but I at least know lots of phrases and am willing to try. I've also left this continent and it didn't involve serving in the military. Traveling outside the US should be required of every person born here. 

You'd be surprised to find the world isn't flat and people are perfectly able to function and live fulfilled lives without ever having touched ground here. You'd also find numerous reasons why people hate the US and it's not because of our "freedom". It's because this gov't has terrorized, starved and subjugated citizens around the world all in the name of US dominance. Need I mention the training of people by the CIA who are our "friends" when they fulfill the needs of the gov't and are labeled "terrorists" when they do their own bidding. 

And we stood by and let it happen. As long as some of us could get that picket fence and the rest longed for it nobody said a word. The "American Dream" is about control and domination and greed. Buy this!! Look cool. Be the envy of all your friends. Get the latest gadget or be square. Just charge it - who cares if you can't actually afford it. Don't save any money, sacrifice or deny yourself. You deserve it. You're an American!

Yet some of us want to to look to China as the great Red Evil for it's torture of its citizens and censorship. That's what we do here with our draconian 3-strikes laws, lack of low-cost medical care, growing population of people who are homeless and ridiculous standards of femininity.  

We vote - or don't vote for the elected officials. We have sat by and remained ignorant of what they do and won't demand accountability. We are enamored with someone strictly due to their appearance and how we relate to that image and don't ask any questions about their character. Or we make excuses for the lack of it because we think they're "one of us".  

There is so much more at stake than who we chose for President. Of course the Republicans are trying to do the choosing for us by denying millions (particularly Black people) the right to vote by challenging residency of those who's homes are in foreclosure. No surprise there when you look at the history of this country.

We have to decide what values we hold most true. There are a lot of good people in the world but ignorance is not bliss and nor excusable any more. 

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